Trust may be the missing link in the South African education system
South Africa regularly finds itself languishing near the bottom of global basic education rankings. In the 2013/14 World Economic Forum (WEF) global competitiveness report, we ranked146th out of 148 countries for basic education. By contrast, Finland's education system repeatedly features near the top of the world rankings. In the same WEF report, Finland took the top spot for primary and secondary education. Finland's education success has been attributed to many factors, not the least of them being the country's affluence and willingness to invest in educating its education. I have a different explanation.
What makes the Finnish education system so successful is the high level of trust and collaboration among the leading players. I have been struck by the contrasts in trust levels between Finnish school principals, teachers, parents and learners, and between their South African counterparts.
Power struggles restrict trust
In 2012, I interviewed 40 school principals in the Western Cape and Mpumalanga. In these one-on-one interviews, a recurring theme was power struggles between principals and teachers, with the unions having a significant influence. The principals are supposed to be accountable for the performance of their schools but say they lack the authority to make the teachers work better. The unions also protect the teachers against disciplinary action. There was a marked lack of trust between the principals and the teachers.
In similar interviews with Finnish principals, I had very different results. What I picked up was that the concept of trust was the critical success factor at Finnish schools. Yes, they have money. However, trust and respect between the parents and teachers, the principals and teachers, and the learners and teachers, was strongly in evidence.
Looking for the missing link
Our the initial findings have prompted us to start examining issues such as the concept of trust, motivation and accountability at South African schools in more detail. Our masters and PhD students are looking at various themes, such as how school principals' families and home lives influence their school role, and how motivated teachers are to develop themselves.
There are also plans to extend research on trust at schools by conducting individual interviews with school principals in the North West and Gauteng. Apart from performing qualitative research, we would like to do quantitative studies on how many schools have problems with trust. The intention is to incorporate the findings into teacher training at the Potchefstroom campus, possibly by using mentors, simulation and video recordings of role-playing situations where students are required to show trust and respect in communicating.
The concept of trust and respect are difficult to measure and desired behaviour may also differ from culture to culture. Local context plays a role and we have to be sensitive to cultural differences. Still, the concept of trust is a universal human characteristic. Bringing it to life at South African schools could make all the difference to our ailing education system.
